A High Court judge has moved to quash planning permission for a proposed anaerobic digestion (AD) plant on a 2.14ha site at Ballyduff, Tullamore, Co. Offaly.
Offaly County Council had initially refused planning permission for the AD plant but following an appeal by the developer, Strategic Power, it got the go ahead from An Bord Pleanála, with conditions attached.
The aim was for the AD plant to produce “renewable energy and organic fertiliser through anaerobic digestion of farm by-product including silage, manure and chicken litter” – it had been estimated that 50,000t of feedstock would be sourced from local farms.
The site proposed for AD plant was on the north west fringes of Tullamore, around 2.2km from the town centre and on land that is currently in agricultural use, but which is within the town boundary.
The Grafton Group, which owns a builders merchants store which trades under the name Tullamore Hardware/Chadwicks about 150m from the site for the proposed AD plant, challenged An Bord Pleanala’s decision on the proposed Tullamore plant in the High Court.
In her judgement on the case published last week (Thursday, January 11) Justice Emily Farrell, outlined that the proposed development amounted to a “material contravention” of the Co. Offaly development plan.
The proposed development was within the sole area in County Offaly which is both zoned “business and technology and designated a strategic employment zone”.
Justice Farrell detailed in her judgement: “The total number of jobs which the developer states would be created by the proposed development is 50-70 jobs for the construction phase of
approximately 12 months, and four to five jobs when the development is operational.
“I do not consider that the creation of 50-70 jobs during the 12-month construction phase, and four to five jobs thereafter, is sufficient to comply with the policies and objectives as set out in the development plan, and in particular, the objective of designating the lands as a strategic employment zone.”
The judge also stated that An Bord Pleanála had relied on “an irrelevant consideration, namely the absence of significant adverse environmental effects, in deciding whether or not the proposed development was consistent with the zoning”.
She also stated that in reference to the proposed location for the AD plant there was “nothing in the development plan which supports the interpretation that the importance of a particular land use zoning objective is weakened towards the edge of the lands subject to that zoning objective”.
AD plant
The judge detailed that it was “not in dispute” during the High Court case that the proposed AD development at Ballyduff “would be an acceptable form of energy recovery from primarily agricultural waste, or that it accords with the EU, national and regional waste and sustainable energy policies”.
However Justice Emily Farrell noted that An Bord Pleanala had failed to publish an Environmental Impact Assessment Report (EIAR) carried out on the proposed AD plant which had been a breach of its obligations.
She ordered that the planning permission for the proposed AD plant on the 2.14 ha site at Ballyduff be quashed.